Yesterday, Joe Biden was sworn in as US president surrounded by armed troops, in the middle of a pandemic, weeks after a far-right mob stormed the Capitol building. These are unprecedented times. The capitalists are pinning their hopes on the new administration to pull US capitalism out of this period of chaos and decline, but the writing is on the wall.

In this recent talk to Socialist Appeal supporters, Antonio Balmer (from the Socialist Revolution USA editorial board) discusses the recent dramatic events in Washington, which are yet another symptom of the decline of American capitalism – and a harbinger of revolutionary explosions to come.

For decades, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s German Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has been considered the largest, most-stable and most-influential bourgeois party in Europe. But the CDU is now in crisis and subject to a process of polarisation and emaciation. The election of Armin Laschet as the new party leader does nothing to change this.